On the Attempted Killing of Donald Trump

Donald Trump has nine political lives. And at least two physical ones.

Neither his legion of incendiary comments, his history replete with personal and professional wrongdoing, his cavalier relationship with the truth, his disregard for the dictates of democracy, his being on the wrong side of determinations civil and criminal, his dalliances with autocrats and dictators, nor the multiple investigations and impeachments that defined a destructive presidency have laid him low. And now an attempted assassination, like everything else that has come before, has barely nicked him.

There are many among us who wish that, politically speaking, Donald Trump had died a thousand hard deaths, as we have watched in horror and sometimes resignation as he has, piece by piece and step by step taken down the very foundation of our nearly 250 year experiment in democracy. That he has still survived is at once both terrifying and remarkable. He is a man who has, in our collective estimation, shot and missed the intended target every time he has opened fire on the issues that are at the very heart of our society.

And now, like so much else that surrounds this man, what doesn't kill him will undoubtedly make him stronger in the eyes of those who find him an irresistible force. The image of a bloodied but unbowed Donald Trump, his fist raised in the air in defiance of the shooter and all those who have tried to end his days as a political supernova in this nation, will be shown in high definition at the upcoming Republican convention and without pause to the November 5th election.

Donald Trump, no matter the intention of the shooter, nor the fervent desire of those who would hope he would, politically, shrivel up and die, down but not out.